CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



153 



as to which party better deserves success. In 

 the presidential election before the last, it is an 

 undisputed fact that a numerical majority of 

 the people of the United States did actually 

 vote to restore the Democratic party to power. 



" ' We appeal to you for sympathy and assist- 

 ance, and we hope you will make prompt and 

 favorable response to this letter.' How ? By 

 expressions of confidence ? By telling us the 

 political necessities of your neighborhood ? By 

 going forth as an apostle to demonstrate to 

 the people the excellence of the principles of 

 the Republican party ? No, sir ; none of such 

 sympathy we want. It is your assistance 

 which we hope you will promptly send to us in 

 the shape of ' a bank-check, or draft, or postal 

 money-order,' payable to the treasurer of this 

 committee. 



"Now, Mr. President, I will not insult the 

 Senate by undertaking to prove to it that this 

 is no invitation for a voluntary contribution. I 

 will not waste its time by showing that it is a 

 demand for a specific sum of money, levied ac- 

 cording to a rule, accompanied by a promise 

 and a threat. 'Your purse or your official 

 life ' is the alternative offered ; or, to use the 

 language of President Garfield in describing a 

 circular almost identical in terms with this, 

 ' It is a circular sent to the employes of the 

 Government upon the distinct understanding 

 that, if they fail to make return according to 

 the demand, in check or postal money-order, 

 others will be found to take their places who 

 will receive their salaries and pay up the as- 

 sessment. 1 



" Mr. President, to whom has the circular 

 been sent? I venture to say here upon this 

 floor, and I speak it upon information which 

 challenges my belief, that this circular has been 

 sent out to every person whose name can be 

 found on any of the rolls of employes of the 

 Government, however remote they may be 

 from the source of power itself. The circular 

 has been sent to the Boston custom-house 

 seven hundred copies of it and a demand 

 made for an aggregate of $15,000. It has been 

 sent to the armory at Springfield, and an as- 

 sessment of $18 been made upon each armorer 

 in that institution. It has been sent to the 

 great offices in New York, the post office and 

 the custom-house, and the collector's office, and 

 the various institutions connected with the 

 Government there. These offices have won 

 exceptional credit by reason of their freedom 

 from the debasing arts of political assessments, 

 and yet are to be again plunged into the mire 

 from which they so laboriously have emerged. 

 It has been sent out to employes at Chicago, 

 and assessments made there of the exact sum 

 of $9.30. How considerately accurate in com- 

 putation ! It has been sent to every postmas- 

 ter in the country ; at least, I have returns 

 from almost every State east of Nevada. It 

 has been sent to the men engaged upon the 

 works on the Ohio River at Marietta, and $18 

 has been assessed and demanded of men who 



day by day for their daily wages cut stone in 

 making the dam. It has been sent to every 

 employe in the departments at Washington, 

 every clerk, and they have been assessed in 

 various amounts from $18 to $50. It has been 

 sent to men who are engaged in daily labor on 

 the Capitol grounds, digging up and beautify- 

 ing these grounds, and $6 has been assessed 

 upon each of them. It has been sent to the 

 boys in the Printing-Office, to whom you pay 

 only a dollar per day and furlough them with- 

 out pay, and $7 has been demanded from each 

 of them. It has been sent to enlisted men in 

 the army, and an assessment of $18 made upon 

 men who are paid from the army appropria- 

 tion bill. Wherever a name can be found 

 upon the pay-roll of the Government for any 

 amount, great or small, this circular has been 

 sent, or is now being sent. 



"I said it had been sent to every clerk in all 

 these departments. Why, sir, it has been sent 

 to those unfortunate ladies whom the exigencies 

 of life now compel to support a family off the 

 pittance painfully earned by them, which would 

 scarcely have sufficed to dispense their yearly 

 charity in other days. It has been sent to the 

 women who scrub out the departments in this 

 city, whose poverty is so great that when they 

 leave for their daily work they are obliged to 

 lock up in their close and fetid rooms the in- 

 fant children who can not be allowed to wan- 

 der in danger in the streets. It has been sent 

 to the employes of the Senate, and men have 

 been required to pay $30 in order that they 

 may hold their places. 



"Nay, more, Mr. President, it has been sent, 

 at least in the other House, and possibly in this, 

 to the little pages bright, intelligent, active 

 little fellows, who do the bidding of members 

 there and here. I imagine I can see this grave 

 committee, with this circular in their hands, 

 going to one of these little pages, and urging 

 him by his appreciation of the emergencies of 

 the country, by his appreciation of the excel- 

 lence of Republican practices, by his dread of 

 the restoration of the Democratic party to 

 power, to make his contribution of $9 in order 

 to avert such a terrible calamity. 



"Mr. President, if this were not a sad scene 

 of political degeneracy and partisan tyranny, it 

 would be in many of its aspects a broad farce. 



" I have no fitting words in which to express 

 my apprehension of the degradation and dan- 

 ger of this whole system, of which this is one 

 of the most dangerous outgrowths. It de- 

 moralizes and breaks down every man con- 

 nected with it, those who give and those who 

 take, alike. Among the names on this circular 

 are some of our own cherished associates and 

 members, men of the other House, also, who 

 stand high in the estimation of their party and 

 their country. They are important factors in 

 wielding the political destinies not only of their 

 party but of their country, honorable, upright, 

 excellent gentlemen, to whom we would will- 

 ingly commit and do commit our honor, and 



